The Provence landscape at Terre Blanche
Having spent my student year abroad working as a language assistant in Cannes, I’ve always been that smug git, who, on any subsequent business or family trip to the Riviera, lapses into French with the taxi drivers and staff, having practised and perfected the sentence, “Oh it’s been so long since I last spoke the language!” I always know the local specialities, the nearest Zara and the best place for a late-night Armenian kebab. So it came as a shock to my system to exit Nice airport and not have a clue where we were going.
Provence, only a half-hour drive away? Are you sure?
And so it began. I’d always assumed Marseille was the nearest airport for Provence, but within twenty minutes we were off the autoroute and winding away from the sea up into the woody hillside, circling lakes and pretending not to notice a couple of questionable women loitering in plastic chairs, before arriving at a fabulous, rather Californian-looking gated estate flanked by lavender. Although now I think about it, it’s probably the Americans who have ripped off the French, but they just do everything bigger and louder so you assume it was their idea to begin with. Anyway, driving into Terre Blanche, under the arch of trees gently touching overhead, felt like driving through a Cézanne painting: all terracotta roofs, twisting herb bushes, and patches of violet in the distance.
I always know the local specialities, the nearest Zara and the best place for a late-night Armenian kebab
I swiftly began to salivate at the idea of warm tapenade bread, olive oil from the nearby village, and crunches of Camargue salt that looks like gravelly snow. The silence and the sun warming my arms made me want to say all sorts of things like “how rustic” and “so artisanal”, but I couldn’t because when I saw the staff I got all tongue-tied and couldn’t speak English let alone contrived French. If there were a male equivalent of the Victoria’s Secret Angels, then Terre Blanche has recruited them and stationed them on every corner, ordering each set of dark eyes to twinkle on tap. The sculpted wonders appeared at every instant: to help with luggage, open doors, drive buggies, or just to wave from behind a thyme bush.
Terre Blanche feels like its own village in the Provencal hills. Golf carts ferry guests between the 115 suites and villas – which have views of nothing but cypress trees, valleys and blue sky – and there’s a distinct feeling of being on a retreat; the nearest village and market is more than a twenty-minute drive away. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what Terre Blanche is. It has two beautiful golf courses, complete with black swans in the lakes, and offers some kind of fancy state-of-the-art biomechanics swing programme. But it’s also the place to go if you want to eat foie gras prepared in eight different forms and proper brick-red fish soup with golden shards of croutons and dollops of buttery-smooth rouille. Far from being a jeans and Converse sort of place, it still has a permanently jolly, après-ski atmosphere in the central living room/bar area where tanned ladies in furry gilets and upturned collars roar with laughter over Hendrick’s cocktails.
The pool at Terre Blanche
And then there’s the spa, which looks much like I imagine Caesar’s personal baths might have. Housed within its own compound, a short walk from the main building – or a lazy buggy ride should you truly want to pamper yourself – the spa is one of the most impressive I’ve seen attached to any hotel. Skylit and held up by ten magnificent pillars, the main area is hung with low-swinging lamps that hover just above one 20-metre pool which meanders into another smaller one filled with whooshing jets and massage beds. The latter opens out into the gardens, making it bright and airy instead of having that muggy chlorine-filled atmosphere synonymous with headaches and general wooziness. It’s all terribly swanky, with nice attention to detail: the ice water is filled with slices of cucumber and mint, and there are trays of almonds and Brazil nuts rather than four star bowls of fruit. Post-massage, when your face is rimmed with the imprint from the table and your hair oily, you’ll find the changing rooms are stocked full of moisturising creams and shower gels along with an array of cleansers, toners, combs and toothbrushes.
Before a massage, guests are invited to choose from lemongrass and mandarin, jasmine, ylang-ylang or lavender oils. Seeing as I had the beginnings of what turned out to be a fortnight of flu, I chose lemongrass and mandarin as my stuffy-headed reasoning was that it might have similar qualities to Lemsip. Wonderful though the massage was, lying face down on a table renders it nigh-on impossible to wipe a runny nose. My fault really – I should know by now, after a decade of spa treatments, that having a deep tissue back rub with the sniffles involves watching tiny droplets fall periodically from your face and splash like Chinese water torture onto the floor for an hour. You’re better off with foot reflexology.
But the main reason to come here is for the four restaurants – Le Faventia in particular. Dinner here is an evening of interactive theatre. The biggest amuse-bouche I have ever seen arrives: it’s like a velvet-skinned Indian puri inflated with a football pump. It has to be torn into steaming strips and paired with champagne. It’s followed by three shelled langoustines, plump and curled like newborn triplets in the middle of a crème brulee mousse. Fresh duck foie gras is blended with yoghurt and wrapped in a cone made from a coil of red berries spaghetti that tastes much like a strawberry bootlace. The only truly silly bit is three pieces of popcorn on top. Then there’s more foie gras served like a Swiss roll, sheathed in a gelatinous berry film, with a red onion caramelised filling (and more popcorn). Thankfully the sea bass casserole with truffles and roasted lemon gnocchi is free of Haribo. But oh, the effort they have gone to! A sheaf of twelve vertical pieces of macaroni is secured with a single thread of chive in a creamy reduction, while the main implement used to create the chocolate and mango iced mousse with peanuts is tweezers. The Chariot de Fromage, a huge old dresser, is wheeled in by four people and holds more than thirty different types of cheese. Then comes the sweet trolley, a wonderland of jars filled with pastel-coloured nougat, slabs of nutty chocolate, and boxes of sweeties tied in pink bows. This is the longest gastronomical performance I have ever sat through – the encores border on the risible when a tiered silver platter with halved macarons pricked with gold leaf arrive.
I bid my farewells, request a buggy and shamelessly travel the 50 feet around the corner to my villa.C
Terre Blanche, 3100 Route de Bagnols en Foret, 83440 Tourrettes, France
+33(0)4 94 39 90 00; terre-blanche-com
*Eugène Terre’Blanche (1941–2010). Not a nice man